In Ted Butler's Archive

LOCKED AND LOADED

We are locked and loaded for an upside move of great significance in gold and silver. In fact, I have trouble envisioning how we won’t see a very large move higher in the metals. I know that the only thing that will short-circuit a large up move in silver and gold is aggressive short selling by JPMorgan as it has on every price rally over the past ten years. Then why am I more convinced that JPMorgan won’t short aggressively on the next rally? The main reason is because JPMorgan has been able to buy back so many COMEX gold and silver short contracts over the past two or three months. It is hard to imagine it replicating this short-covering feat anytime in the future. At a minimum, JPMorgan has bought back 90,000 short gold contracts, completely eliminating its COMEX gold short position and 30,000 COMEX silver shorts. That’s the equivalent of 9 million gold ounces and 150 million silver ounces; leaving its 20-million-ounce physical gold ownership completely unencumbered to the upside and its 750-million-ounce silver physical position encumbered only by 50 million ounces of paper shorts.

The last time JPMorgan added silver shorts aggressively was from April to early June, when it had to add 20,000 new shorts to contain the price, a much more aggressive stance than previously. You’ll recall back then JPM turned into the silver short seller of first resort. I attributed that to its strong desire to buy back gold shorts, to the point of double-crossing other commercials. Having now completely covered its COMEX gold short position, JPMorgan has lost the incentive to cap silver prices so aggressively. There’s no doubt that the buyback of 30,000 silver short contracts since June took unusually engineered price action, as is evident in the unprecedented ten weeks of price declines.

And when the technical funds move to buy back their record number of gold and silver shorts, will they be maneuvered into another record short position? These technical funds may be as dumb as dirt, but there’s no guarantee they’ll be snookered back into short positions likely bought back at losses.

Finally, the explosion in COT (Commitment of Traders report) commentary on the internet and elsewhere guarantees that if the crooks at JPMorgan sell aggressively short on the next rally, more market commentators are going to notice it and publicize it.  What has contributed mightily to JPMorgan’s complete dominance of silver and gold over the past decade is that few knew what these market gangsters were up to.  It wouldn’t seem to be in JPM’s best interest to go to the well yet again because of this negative publicity. It would really cause an uproar. It looks to me like we are going to see the price explosion we’ve been waiting for quite soon.

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